Participation in research and development at the Tshikonelo agricultural project,Northern province

This article takes to task certain assumptions about participation in research and development, and criticises them for being decontextualised and ethnographically uninformed. Results of social scientific research at an existing agricultural project in the Northern Province of South Africa are brought to bear on the theory and assumptions of participatory research and development. The study starts with a theoretical account of participatory research. The point is made that there is not necessarily any connection between participatory research and participatory development. It is concluded from the subsequent case study that participation in research and development could be negatively influenced by local power dynamics, by institutional reluctance to experiment with participation, and by policy decisions and circumstances that do not lend themselves to social change. The significance of participation cannot be deduced in isolation from its context of implementation. It is concluded that participation by itself would not necessarily lead to these changes.     

Central Bank Communication in a Low Interest Rate Environment

When interest rates are low, or negative, central banks must increasingly rely on effective communication to ease the stance of monetary policy. Empirical evidence suggests that the ECB’s forward guidance, consisting of a carefully expounded series of expectations involving both key policy rates and asset purchases, has been successful in (i) reducing the sensitivity of forward rates to macroeconomic news, (ii) insulating euro area financial conditions from external shocks and (iii) providing additional monetary policy accommodation at a time when the room for cuts in key policy rates has been very limited. At the same time, a central bank cannot always be sure how its forward guidance works and much of the challenge arises from the interaction between central banks and financial markets. In this environment, and for forward guidance to be credible and effective, policymakers need to be clear about their reaction function, regularly align their policy expectations with the evolving assessment of the state of the economy and its likely evolution, and act accordingly.     

Reform des Gemeindesteuersystems—Zurück zur kommunalen Selbstverwaltung

Das heutige kommunale Steuersystem weist insgesamt keine ausreichende Ergiebigkeit auf und hat sich aufgrund wiederholter Eingriffe des Gesetzgebers seit vielen Jahren nicht mehr wachstumsproportional entwickelt. Wie sollte das Gemeindesteuersystem reformiert werden?     

Die Ablehnung der Softwarepatentrichtlinie: Ein zweifelhafter Erfolg!

Anfang Juli 2005 hat das Europ?ische Parlament die Softwarepatentrichtlinie zurückgewiesen. Nach welchen Regeln werden computerimplementierte Erfindungen derzeit behandelt? Welche Folgen hat die Ablehnung der Richtlinie für die zukünftige Behandlung von Software-Entwicklungen?     

Securitized and Direct Real Estate Factors in the Pricing of US Bank Stocks

This article analyzes the role of securitized and direct real estate risks in the pricing of US bank stocks. Real estate risk measures are drawn from the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts (NAREIT) and NCREIF indexes. Beside the real estate, the other risk exposures considered are the market, the term, and the default premiums. The period covered runs from February 1990 to December 2015. GMM estimates of conditional multifactor models report considerable evidence in favor of real estate risk in US bank stocks.     

C2C电子商务模式税收的国际经验借鉴及路径选择

对C2C电子商务模式进行征税,一直饱受热议.在笔者看来,对其征税符合税收公平原则,于相关法律有据可依,且不会影响个人的创业热情,利于税制改革的深化和完善,并在国际上有先例可循.就具体实施措施而言,应明确税收原则,明确税制要素,强化税收征管,进而健全相关的税收体制.     

Automatic Fiscal Stabilisers: What They Are and What They Do

The global financial and economic crisis has revived the debate in the academic literature and in policy circles about the size and effectiveness of automatic fiscal stabilisers. Especially in the euro area where monetary policy is centralised and discretionary fiscal policy making is constrained by the EU fiscal rules, knowing the size and the effectiveness of automatic stabilisers is crucial. While automatic stabilisers are a fairly established concept in the fiscal policy literature, there is still no consensus about their actual nature and their effectiveness. This paper shows that differences in opinion mirror a deeper disagreement over how the budget would look like without automatic stabilisers. This issue is addressed by defining two types of counterfactual budgets giving rise to two different interpretations about the nature of automatic stabilisation. Simulations with a structural model confirm that the degree of smoothing is conditional on how the counterfactual budget, i.e. the budget without automatic stabilisers, is defined.     

Korruption in Deutschland: Reformmaßnahmen

Ohne Zusammenfassung